Kotaku Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:15 PM
Gaming's favorite Nintendo mascot has had his ups and downs. Here they are The post Every <i>Super Mario</i> Game, Ranked From Worst To Best appeared first on Kotaku. |
Kotaku Saturday, September 13, 2025 10:00 AM
EA won't say anything about whether the upcoming and highly optimized shooter is coming to Switch 2 The post <i>Battlefield 6</i> Devs Struggled To Get It Running On Xbox Series S appeared first on Kotaku. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:30 PM With Battlefield 6 boasting a $70 price tag, Insurgency Sandstorm is a brilliant alternative that's shockingly cheap right now in this sale. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:27 PM Get free in-game cash to purchase your next new ride with the latest Car Dealership Tycoon codes on Roblox. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:22 PM The top Java and Bedrock Minecraft servers to join and get you playing online, with Hypixel, Skyblock, Netherite, and more - updated September 2025. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:14 PM Here are all the active Blue Lock Rivals codes that will take your on-pitch flair to the next level so you can dominate the opposition. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:04 PM Get handy rewards, like the spins needed to quicky roll for the game's latest style, with these Roblox Volleyball Legends codes. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:29 PM Survive the night and live to tell the tale once more with these new Roblox Hunty Zombie codes for the hit zombie shooter experience. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:34 PM Contribute to the growth of the Fall Market on your server by knowing which Roblox Grow a Garden prickly plants and fruits you can use. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:51 PM Get a sweeping selection of decals for your weapons and gear with new Destiny Rising codes for the PC version of the mobile shooter, Rising. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:41 PM Let this complete list of Roblox Flashpoint Worlds Collide codes get you up to speed in the new DC-inspired crime fighting simulator game. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:45 PM New Blox Fruits codes list and how to redeem for Roblox in-game rewards, 2x exp boosts, reset stats, money, free Beli, and more. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:42 PM Acquire free mounts, gems, and so much more in this Solo Leveling-inspired take on a Roblox classic with new Arise Crossover codes. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:47 PM Keep those dabbers ready to go at all times with these daily Bingo Blitz free credits links used to keep you scratching off more cards. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:35 PM Get free seed packs, decorations, pets, and more with the latest Grow a Garden codes on Roblox. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:20 PM As Hades 2 prepares to leave early access, newcomer Shape of Dreams is winning hearts with elements of League of Legends and Path of Exile. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:39 PM Here are all the working Sonic Speed Simulator codes for free Chaos and boosts to help you speed through the official Sonic Roblox game. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 11:38 AM The latest mainline game in the classic horror series is almost here, and you can score Silent Hill f for $1 right now, if you're lucky. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 11:16 AM Mixing Elden Ring style combat with Norse mythology and the extraction structure of Dark and Darker, the next Mistfall Hunter beta is soon. |
PCGamesN Saturday, September 13, 2025 10:00 AM Disappearing Borderlands 4 world bosses are its most common frustration outside of the PC performance woes, proving we need a Thunderdome. |
Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:10 PM  In general these days it's never a good time to release a video game unless you're Rockstar, but in recent months it's been made even harder due to numerous payment processors cracking down on digital storefronts like Valve and Itch.io. There's a host of reasons this is problematic, but one less spoken about how this is also an issue of preservation. GOG, another digital storefront, this one owned by The Witcher developer CD Projekt, is known for their preservation efforts, and in a recent interview they shared a bit of their thoughts in relation to these recent issues regarding payment processors. |
Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:05 PM  I don't play online games particularly often, mostly the only ones that I do enjoy are the kind of games I can play with just my friends. People are mean, you see, and I have a sensitive soul, and also I often find them deeply boring conceptually and in practice. Take of that what you will in relation to this story about Dota 2! Moving on swiftly to a topic that I promise connects to this intro, Gabe Newell! He is a co-founder of Valve, and a noted Dota 2 lover. He also, apparently, is someone who is often subjected to ridicule while playing the very same game his company makes. |
Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:02 PM  Whenever there is word of a video game's release date being changed, it's hardly ever surprising because nine times out of ten, it's because it has been delayed. That's just the way things are these days, no one can have the luxury of Team Cherry, who took so long making Silksong just because they were having fun. However, in this case, the release date shifting news is actually a positive one, as Dying Light: The Beast will be launching just that little bit earlier. |
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Siliconera Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:00 PM
There are a surprising number of official hololive Vtuber manga series out there! Magical Girl Holowitches and HoloX Meeting are among them. The thing about some of those, however, is that context can matter. It helps if you have an idea who the Vtubers behind the characters are, especially in the case of the one based on Secret Society holoX. Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia, which Square Enix released outside Japan, is different. While it does help if you know who folks like Fubuki Shirakami, Mio Ookami, and Ayame Nakiri are, the way it's handled and execution means it works just as well if you're totally unfamiliar and looking for a series that almost has a Touhou type of vibe and involves kami protecting a country.
Editor's Note: There will be some mild spoilers for the first volume of the Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia Hololive Vtubers manga below.
Yamato is a land in which kami and humans live in a symbiotic relationship. The humans generate and help maintain aura. Kami need that energy in order to grow and develop their strength. They, in turn, use their powers to protect the humans who live alongside them. For example, they might use their abilities to remove Stigma, negative aura, from humans to protect them from corruption and transformation. However, while there are kami who are benevolent and air the community, yokai that absorbed aura will use it maliciously and cause corruption and dissent, feeding off of the chaos. Fubuki and Mio are two such kami, and Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia follows as we watch them use their abilities to assist in daily incidents in town as well as take part in a kidnapping case with malevolent yokai behind it.
One reason Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia works so well even if you have no idea who the Hololive Vtubers Fubuki and Mio are is that the series is more loosely based on the concept of who they are, rather than the actual individuals. The Holoearth Chronicles series is a spin-off and alternate reality. There may be some personality traits reflected here and the character designs match, but this is an entirely original story that also happens to involve "them." It's the same reason why the game Fubuki: Zero in on Holoearth, which is based on the same premise and scenario, would work for anyone.
Another reason is that the Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia manga is fantastic at establishing Fubuki and Mio as original characters. While the first few pages do start in medias res, with Fubuki and Mio in the midst of fighting the oni Ayame, it immediately goes into a short tale establishing who Fubuki is as a character. It shows how she's a Kami, that her role is to defend Yamato, specifically the town right near her shrine, and that she will remove negative Stigmas from people that could make them behave hurtfully or even turn into monsters. At the same time, it shows she's a down-to-earth gamer who is quite casual, to the point where she might forget her very necessary sword at Mio's place or prefer instant udon to the fresh, homemade kind.
The premise also means that the Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia is more about building up these two characters, their friendships, and their abilities as they take on situations to help the people of Yamato. While there may be references to the activities and lore for the Hololive Vtubers in the manga, such as Fubuki's Oruyanke mascot appearing or her being mistaken for a cat rather than a fox, this is completely self-contained. We miss nothing if we don't watch them. This is all about the personal development of these two characters based on the performers. And, frankly, the development of them is quite good. Especially Mio, her backstory, and her powers once her and Fubuki head off on a mission to save some missing children.
I also mentioned it felt Touhou Project like earlier, and I feel like that's another reason it works. Shrine maidens who are young women with supernatural powers dealing with yokai? A setting inspired by a more historic type period in Japan? While this is a Hololive Vtuber manga, it can offer more of a supernatural monster-of-the-week, incident-resolving atmosphere to it.
The Hololive Vtuber vibes are strong in Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia, yes, but the manga is also super accessible. The characters and story are handled in such a way that you don't need any experience with the performers to enjoy it. It can help with some inside jokes and references. But it's a really well-handled, stand-alone project.
Volume 1 of Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia is available now, and Square Enix will release the second volume of the manga inspired by Hololive Vtubers Fubuki Shirakami, Mio Ookami, and Ayame Nakiri on December 2, 2025.
The post Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia Is Fun Even Without Context appeared first on Siliconera. |
Siliconera Saturday, September 13, 2025 9:00 AM
Firefly Village is a farming life sim along the lines of Stardew Valley and Story of Seasons, but with the goal of making things much simpler. As in everything is shorter, streamlined, and less involved than others in the genre. While it's a novel experiment to see how much you can cut back and still leave a satisfying sim behind, it also results in things feeling unbalanced and quality of life features being abandoned in the process.
In Firefly Village, we're a newcomer who moves into town to take up residence in an empty shack with some farmland. Only a handful of folks live in the area and there are only a few screens worth of spaces to explore. Each season lasts only seven days, with a day being four minutes, so it eventually comes down to just handling our 54 plots for crops, handful of animals, and basically five folks living in the area. Upgrades? They're minimal and involve things like a kitchen and deck. Animals? You probably only end up with six chickens. Your goal is to enjoy effective days that pass quickly and don't feature a lot of busywork.
It's interesting. Firefly Village is absolutely every element of a farming life sim distilled down to the most critical parts, so technically a lot of what we'd expect from Story of Seasons or Stardew Valley is here. We can become best friends with the five villagers. There are eventually supplemental activities like cooking, fishing, and mining. We can collect items like scarecrows. There are festivals to celebrate occasions like Halloween. The things we expect are here, and Josh Koenig Games does show we can accomplish the full farming experience in truncated days days and seasons, still accomplishing things.
However, a big part of playing Firefly Village makes me realize how much I miss some of the things that naturally come from larger farming life sim games like Stardew Valley or Story of Seasons. There's the absence of quality of life features. Want to harvest things or do some gathering? You can hold 12 items, and they don't stack. Want a cow? That will be 5,000g, and it honestly can take quite a bit of time to earn that money. Tools? Aside from your initial farming equipment, you need to wait until they randomly appear in the store and you can stock them. Need to water or gather? Sometimes your character won't face the right direction you need to perform an action and you need to fiddle around with things.
Also, while farming life sims like Story of Seasons and Stardew Valley can have days that sometimes feel long or like we're "grinding" through a schedule, playing Firefly Village made me realize that time wasn't wasted. Going through those routines could be calming. I liked waiting around while fishing. Or the deeper connections that came from its socialization that weren't present with the three-heart-level friendships here. The fact that some things did happen so quickly here made it feel less satisfying when I'd harvest crops, care for animals, or reach a relationship milestone. Yes, there's no bloat here. But there were times I wish there were to make things feel a bit more fulfilling.
I do appreciate that the simplicity in Firefly Village also extends to the appearance. The design is minimalistic, but still incredibly effective. It calls to mind the older Story of Seasons games on, say, the Game Boy or SNES. There's a charm to it, and I also really appreciated the artistic direction for character portraits that make them feel rustic.
I appreciate Firefly Village as an experiment into how much you can cut from a Stardew Valley or Story of Seasons style farming game while presenting a cohesive experience. It is interesting. Succinct too! It looks great as well, with some adept spritework. But at the same time, things go so quickly that I didn't feel a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment from taking my time and watching my virtual farm and life blossom over time. It's a charming way to pass the time, but you might not get as much out of it as one of the more robust, larger games.
Firefly Village is available on PCs.
The post Review: Firefly Village Is a Condensed Farming Life Sim appeared first on Siliconera. |
Destructoid Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:05 PM
Borderlands 4 has completely revamped and changed how rides worked from the previous games, and you can now drive your own vehicle.
Not only can you summon a vehicle when you want, but you can also customize and change how it feels and looks inside the game. But to do so, you'll need to unlock your first vehicle.
Table of contents
How to summon your vehicle in Borderlands 4?
Your first vehicle in Borderlands 4 will be a Digirunner, which is rewarded as part of the Down and Outbound main campaign mission. Once you eliminate the enemies and meet Rush, he will send you to Conway. Conway will stand before a barn and reward you with your first vehicle.
You can't drive the vehicle standing in front of you. However, what you can do instead is to summon your ECHO-4 to scan the vehicle (Digirunner in this case) and add it to your collection. To do this, press the Z button.
Once the scan is complete, you can press your X button to summon your vehicle. Your equipped vehicle will be summoned if you have more than one in your collection. If you're inside a building/in a restricted area, you can't summon your vehicle inside.
How to customize your vehicle in Borderlands 4
Vehicular customization is enabled when you get your first Digirunner. Press the tab button, and then go to customization. There will be a separate tab for vehicles. You can change the paint job, but that requires additional skins.
You can also customize the weapons and stats of your vehicle by applying different parts. You can get more parts by completing side quests and missions, and then use them for your vehicles. The customization options vary across different models, so be on the lookout for all.
As you might have imagined, there are plenty of different vehicles to unlock in Borderlands 4.
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Destructoid Saturday, September 13, 2025 2:42 PM
The Battlefield 6 developer team focused really hard on making the game run as smoothly as possible, especially on hardware that is less-than-stellar by today's standards. One console in particular caused a lot of headache, but they still managed to make it work.
Playing the Battlefield 6 open beta, I truly started appreciating EA, because it was the first time in a long time that a AAA studio had a well-performing, smooth, and optimized game. And, what's more, it was just the beta, with months of testing and development time left in the tank. It ran equally well on my RX 9070 XT and my friend's 3070, despite the seeming disparity between these two pieces of hardware, which truly drives the optimization point home.
However, that didn't come easy, and the BF6 dev team really gave it their all to ensure their upcoming title worked as smoothly as possible on a wide range of machines. Speaking with Kotaku, the team behind BF6 commented on how they struggled to make the game perform on the Xbox Series S, a lower-end console from 2020, which has caused trouble for players and devs alike in the past (by no fault of its own, given its capabilities).
The Series S "limited memory" proved a "challenge" for the devs, who noted a lot of crashing while testing the game on it, which led them to pour more time and effort into memory efficiency and optimization, with results that went beyond getting the Series S to run the game better. According to technical director Christian Buhl, optimizing memory for the Series S led to the "whole game [being] better and more stable."
Specific performance optimizations were made just for the Series S, which Buhl affirms now runs the game at a "smooth 60 fps," which is more than any (console) gamer would want. As I've noted above, the whole game runs well on a wide array of machines and was clearly optimized for mid- to low-end hardware, which is exactly what every big game should target to avoid getting into the kind of situations Monster Hunter Wilds and Borderlands 4 found themselves in.
Bad performance in AAA games has become somewhat of a meme at this point. Whether it's game-breaking bugs or the game simply refusing to run, the AAA industry has become recognized for massive budgets that apparently don't account for quality assurance or optimization, which makes EA's effort that much more appreciated.
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Destructoid Saturday, September 13, 2025 2:01 PM
Though previous reports and announcements from Cloud Imperium Games seemed to confidently place Squadron 42's release window within 2026, it's now uncertain if that target will be met.
According to a recent statement from its director, Jared Huckaby (thanks Massively OP), it is unclear if Squadron 42 "will make it" by the end of next year, throwing shade on the previously announced 2026 launch.
However, Huckaby did try to inspire confidence by saying the team is "going to do every single thing possible to make it," and thus avoid CitizenCon this year, which he said would be a "distraction." He also explained Squadron 42 won't be doing larger events this year to help alleviate the developers and allow them to focus on meeting the 2026 release window.
The announcement of Squadron 42, which has been in development for over a decade, being possibly delayed yet again, caused a lot of stir among fans of the game. Huckaby personally replied to one Roberts Space Industries forum post, where he reassured players CIG is doing everything in its power to meet the release, as well as that it's "on track."
Not everyone on the forums was convinced, however, as many pointed out the numerous delays both Squadron 42 and Star Citizen have had in over a decade since being first announced, with one user pointing out CIG shouldn't have given a release date if it wasn't sure it could make it.
I recently covered how Star Citizen and Squadron 42 have been in development for more than a decade, with CIG reportedly racking up over $1 billion thus far, with official contributions from fans numbering over $859 million. Squadron 42 itself, which was announced to be launching in 2026, started development in 2014, and has been delayed on several occasions, with many believing neither it nor Star Citizen would ever see a traditional "full" release.
CIG founder Chris Roberts also stated he thinks Squadron 42 will be as big a release as GTA 6, the latter arguably being the most anticipated title of all time and set to earn billions in its opening weekend. That game is also slated for a 2026 release, if Rockstar Games, also known for its delays, doesn't push it back even further.
Squadron 42 is a single-player spacefaring title set in the Star Citizen universe and developed side-by-side with it. It's set to star various Hollywood superstars, including Gary Oldman, Henry Cavill, Mark Hamill, Andy Serkis, and others.
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Destructoid Saturday, September 13, 2025 1:35 PM
You'll always find some sort of otherworldly artifact in your YouTube song mix if you let it run long enough.
I'm not sure how and why the algorithm decided to serve me up this recent banger from Egg Beatz that uses nothing but sound effects from Middle Age strategy game classic Stronghold Crusader to recreate Gorillaz' legendary Feel Good Inc., but it almost makes up for the precipitous drop it has recently caused to many of my favorite creators' view count.
(Almost.)
But back to the banger! While you'll definitely get more out of the song if you have played any of the classic Stronghold games, you can appreciate the skill and effort on display even without any experience with the world of the Rat, the Snake, the Pig, and the Wolf.
Starting off with The Pig's distorted, slowed-down laughter, and the Arabian Assassin unit's classic voice line setting the tone, followed by a slow buildup of the ever-so-common "No change in the treasury, lord," you just immediately know that you're in good hands.
Then it goes on like this:
Again, all this is arranged to the tune of Feel Good Inc., and it works shockingly well.
The best part? This awesome arrangement is now also available on Spotify, courtesy of the team at Firefly Studios being good sports about such a truly transformative work. For my money, this has now surpassed the legendary Age of Empires 2 theme song remix with the unforgettable Wololo autotune.
Yeah, there are some great gems at the bottom of the internet if you are still willing to rep the classics.
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Destructoid Saturday, September 13, 2025 12:18 PM
Hollow Knight Silksong has plenty of Wishes to complete for players looking to 100% the game, and they are of different types and difficulties.
Specific Wishes are easier to complete than the rest, but the more difficult ones typically offer better rewards. Completing certain Wishes is essential to expand the game's central lore.
If you want to complete as many Wishes as possible, this guide will provide all the necessary information.
Complete list of Hollow Knight Silksong Wishes
The table below is the complete list of all the Wishes we have discovered on our journey in the game so far. If we find any further secrets, we will update our guide to reflect the new information.
Completing all the wishes is also mandatory to unlock the secret third act in the game.
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The post All Hollow Knight Silkong Wishes locations, tasks, and rewards appeared first on Destructoid. |
Gaming Instincts – Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:53 PM A trailer was also released. The post Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade Xbox Series and Switch 2 Release Date Announced appeared first on Gaming Instincts - Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism. |
Gaming Instincts – Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:26 PM A trailer was also released. The post Mega Man Star Force: Legacy Collection Announced For PC and Consoles appeared first on Gaming Instincts - Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism. |
Gaming Instincts – Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism Saturday, September 13, 2025 3:06 PM A trailer was also released. The post FATAL FRAME II: Crimson Butterfly REMAKE Announced For PC and Consoles appeared first on Gaming Instincts - Next-Generation of Video Game Journalism. |
